#Baseball Prospectus

A funny thing has happened on the way to what assorted baseball media figures assumed was another 100+ loss season for the Orioles. They've started winning games, sitting on a.500 record of 46-46 at the All-Star break. Instead of fans having to wonder when the prospects will start arriving to turn things from dismal to bearable, now it's more like…

The answer to the question posed in the title of this is probably an easy one: His dad owns more of the Cincinnati Reds than any of the rest of the gaggle of owners in the ownership group. But someone really needs to take the microphone away from him and never let him speak in public again because every time he does so he says something that would…

If Coors Field is hell for pitchers, then Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati might just be Death Valley during a heat wave. Cincinnati Reds pitchers have long known that when at home, the answer to "Would It Dong?" is almost always "Yes" anytime a ball goes in the air. ESPN's Park Factors has Great American in the top-10 most home run-friendly…

The New Year, Volume 2023 is upon us, and that means a dual occasion to reflect upon our misfires of the year prior and look forward to our derelictions of the year to come. As it turns out, this grim ritual of inventory can also be applied to the clubs that play This, Our Baseball. The Royal We shall now do such a thing. Resolution: At least…

Expectations are high in Diamondbacks land. Not only are they coming off an encouraging 85-win season, the team is fresh off an offseason in which it made several high-profile additions. For those wearing the rosiest of glasses, the moves left them dreaming not just about the Diamondbacks reaching the playoffs, but about them chasing down the Los…

Outside of an exhilarating Opening Day victory over the Boston Red Sox, the start of the 2018 season for the Tampa Bay Rays was less than ideal. 17 games into the season the Rays were 4-13 and had dug them a hole they couldn't get themselves out of. This year the Rays the exact opposite has happened. After a disappointing Opening Day loss, the Rays…

Remember when the Oakland A's were trying to hold up the Cardinals in their trade demands for catcher Sean Murphy? Remember how they wanted Laars Nootbaar and Brendan Donovan and one of the Cardinals' top young pitchers? After the Cardinals took a pass and signed free-agent Willson Contreras instead, the A's worked a three-way trade with Atlanta…

Welcome to playoff baseball, where the "best" team wins the championship far less often than in other sports. To wit: According to Baseball Prospectus odds, no team in the 2021 playoff field has better than a 20 percent chance to win the World Series. With eight deserving teams ready to do battle, let's dive into the reasons each particular team…

Aaron Judge is staying put, Trea Turner is headed back to the National League East, Jacob deGrom and Justin Verlander are switching state income taxes and Willson Contreras is changing sides in a heated National League Central rivalry... that's just a taste of the flurry of moves. MLB's first in-person Winter Meetings in three years was a veritable…

A couple weeks ago 30 SB Nation baseball writers got together and conducted the annual SBN GM Simulation. For three days we acted as the GM of a team - I represented the Red Sox once more - with one goal: prepare the 2023 roster. Each GM is given a roster of current players as of the end of the season, so any move the real teams made during the…

On Tuesday, FanGraphs released their playoff odds predictions and Baseball Prospectus released their PECOTA projections on regular season records. Both outlets believe that the Colorado Rockies are the worst team in the National League. According to FanGraphs, the Colorado Rockies only have a 0.2 percent chance of making the playoffs, which is the…

The San Diego Padres had their fair share of problems crop up during the first half, but the good news is that their playoff chances are still relatively strong. While they are just 2.4% likely to win the NL West, they remain in good position to take one of the wild card spots giving them 76.4% playoff odds overall at FanGraphs. The Padres exit the…

The Tampa Bay Rays enjoyed 21-6 month of August bringing them to 84-46. Their hot August was tied with the Los Angeles Dodgers for tops in the majors, and their overall record puts them on par with the San Francisco Giants, also with a.636 winning percentage. With 132 games in the books, the Rays have a 6.0 game lead over the Houston Astros for…

SAN DIEGO - Speaking with reporters before a recent game, Giants manager Gabe Kapler raised some eyebrows with one particular assessment of his club. It wasn't his plea for better energy, nor was it any indictment of their poor play. "It's a different group of guys," Kapler said, referring to the 2022 team versus the one that won 107 games a year…

For the second year in a row, the Toronto Blue Jays made it to the American League Championship Series. And for the second year in a row, the Blue Jays came up short, this time losing to the Cleveland Indians in five games. With a number of players eligible for free agency, most notably Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion, what the team's roster…

One of the most common arguments against the designated hitter coming to the National League was that it would cause a decline in pinch-hitting, therefore removing an element of strategy from the game. It was inevitable, after all, that pinch-hitting opportunities would dry up without pitchers to sub out. Lo and behold, offensive substitutions in…

For the second successive offseason, the shortstop market in free agency is absolutely stacked, with Trea Turner joined by Xander Bogaerts and Carlos Correa after they both opted out of their contracts. With all due respect to Dansby Swanson, those three are in another tier based on their overall tools, past production and expected earning power,…

Jon Singleton's remarkable story continues. The towering first baseman found himself back on a big-league roster for the first time in more than six years when the Milwaukee Brewers selected his contract Tuesday. Singleton wasn't the lone player protected by the Brewers from next month's Rule 5 Draft, as the team also added prospects Brice Turang,…

Today the focus is on Christian Vazquez, the 32-year-old veteran free agent who is gaining in popularity with St. Louis media and fans. THE OVERVIEW: Vazquez spent seven-plus seasons with Boston before being traded to Houston last summer, and he teamed with Martin Maldonado to form a catching tandem that was part of the Astros' run to the World…

Being a good manager is more than just knowing when to go to your bullpen in a tight spot or when to put on that hit-and-run play in the seventh inning. That is certainly part of the job, but it's also about building and maintaining relationships. It's about pulling the right strings when injuries inevitably strike. It's having the skills to take…

The Cardinals are in the market for a catcher. Hopefully they'll be smart about this and view the opening as an opportunity to upgrade their offense. Defense must be a consideration, which doesn't really need to be stated. But in this case the defensive requirement has been overstated, with too much attention being paid to the standard established…

This is likely to be the last year where we have to see our divisional rivals 19 times a season, with the 2023 season promising to see more diversity in match-ups with every team facing each other at least once every year. Still 2022 is a classic year where we'll be seeing a lot of our four divisional rivals, so we figured for the first clash…

This story was excerpted from Adam McCalvy's Brewers Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, . And to get it regularly in your inbox. It all comes down to the final few days for the Brewers. If things go exactly right for three straight days, they'll make it to a fifth consecutive postseason. If things don't go right, they'll go home. The…

With the Padres opting for a bullpen game on Thursday, right-hander Yu Darvish will have an extra day of rest when he starts Friday's series opener against the Chicago White Sox. In a perfect world, it would be Darvish's last start of the regular season. "You hope," Padres manager Bob Melvin said, "but you also have to look at the last game, too.…

As the bullpen piled up a National League-high 688 1/3 innings last year, Pierce Johnson admittedly was among the Padres' relievers dragging at the end of the season. A year later, the silver lining is obvious after the 31-year-old right-hander missed 119 games in the middle of the season to an elbow injury. "It's a game-changer feeling this fresh…

As in any combination of four Padres wins or four Brewers losses will punch the team's ticket to a full-season postseason for the first time since 2006. Sure, anything can still happen but the folks at Baseball Prospectus project the Padres' playoff odds at 98.9 percent after shaving two wins off their magic number with eight games left in the…

In a 6 to 2 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers, the 2022 Cardinals have won the National League Central Division. St. Louis entered yesterday's contest in Milwaukee with a 6.5-game lead on the Brewers, 7 wins up, and a magic number of 3. It does take some kind of magic to make 1 (Cardinals) win+ 1 (Brewers) loss = 3. But, hey, I don't do the math.…

In the MLB futures markets, the Los Angeles Dodgers are the favorites to win their eighth World Series title and second since 2020. In this article, we will examine the movements in the MLB futures odds and determine which picks are worth investing in. It is the final month of the 2022 MLB season, and the race to make the postseason and secure…

Back-to-back losses have dropped the Padres' playoff odds, according to Baseball Prospectus, from 96 percent before Thursday's game down to 83 percent heading into Saturday. That's because both the Phillies and the Brewers have won each of the last two days, dropping the Padres into the No. 6 seed, just two games ahead of the Brewers. First pitch…

As Wil Myers was making his way back from the injured list, he demonstrated just how self-aware he is as a player. "I've still got one more hot streak in me," he said earlier this summer. Myers had one homer at the time. He's hit three for the Padres in 36 games since returning from the injured list Aug. 1, a stretch in which he has a.277/.333/.429…

Twice this season the Padres have had a five-game winning streak. A third - which is possible Wednesday with a 6:40 p.m. home game against St. Louis - will inch the Padres ever closer to clinching a postseason berth. After Tuesday's victory over the Cardinals, which came on the same night the Phillies and Brewers lost, the Padres had their…

Bradford Doolittle ESPN Staff Writer Sports reporter, Kansas City Star, 2002-09 Writer, Baseball, Baseball Prospectus Co-author, Pro Basketball Prospectus Member, Baseball Writers Association of America Member, Professional Basketball Writers Association David Schoenfield ESPN Senior Writer Covers MLB for ESPN.com Former deputy editor of Page…

Hello folks and happy Wednesday! Let's check in on the latest from around baseball. Daniel Kramer at MLB broke down the reasons behind the M's playoff odds surge, which is now over 99% at Fangraphs. The majority of minor league players turned in signed union cards to the MLBPA, who then asked Major League Baseball for voluntary recognition of the…

At this point, it's becoming a meme. The Orioles chug along, at or around.500, and our playoff odds continue to say that they'll almost certainly miss postseason play. Across the internet, sites like Baseball Reference and FiveThirtyEight give them a higher chance. The headlines write themselves: "Why doesn't FanGraphs believe in the Orioles?" Just…